Legend of Heroes / Kongming / Cao Cao

[Moogle-squared]

Does anyone know where I can obtain the games mentioned in the subject of this thread? I've played them years ago, and would like to play them again, but they are so old that I can't find them anywhere. Thank you for your help.

[Tong Kaiyi]

Hmmmm...You've played these games. Are they good then? Are heard they're like RPGs but...that's all. So if someone could inform me, I'd appreciate it.

[Lady Wu]

You can try www.sanguogame.net

Beware that Legend of Kongming doesn't run on XP. I've tried *EVERYTHING* but nothing works. Hence I kept my Win98 machine.

Tong: They are fabulous games. I'm sad that Koei never released them in English, because I'd make everyone I know play them because they're so good. Legend of Heroes has to be the most addictive 4MB game in existence (I don't remember doing anything else in high school, and to this day I still hum the tunes from that game and curse the evil Battle of Changban stage). Legend of Kongming is ok--it's got a more historically plausible plot (come on, Cao Cao feigning his own death and watch helplessly as Cao Pi screws up the kingdom? Give me a break...), the graphics are improved, and the story (Zhuge Liang's early life is revealed piece by piece through cutscenes) is better told. It could have been better given that it's made years after Heroes. The battle system is pretty much the same; I can't remember anything that stands out.

Legend of Cao Cao, though, is FANTASTIC. Most user-friendly game I've seen--friendly to people who are new to this type of game (everything you want to know about the gameplay is explained in the game, gradually and clearly), and yet still giving a challenge to experienced gamers. Best game balance. Excellent music. Weapons/Armour gain experience and level up just as you do, which is a neat design. Great dialogues. Battles are always interesting (you don't get the feeling that you've done the same thing just the last stage)--the only complaint is that the duel scenes are horrible (but since you can't control the duels, it doesn't really matter). Characterization of Cao Cao has a lot of depth (unlike the protagonists of Heroes/Kongming, Cao Cao isn't just good or evil, but has a lot of personality. In fact, you can control how good/evil he is, and you'll get different storylines/endings..). I can't recommend a game more than this one. I really believe that Legend of Cao Cao embodies the ideal of intelligent game design. Plus you get to play as Cao Cao, who is just plain cool. Kudos to Koei for taken someone who's usually a villain figure and restoring him to Cool-hood.

Edit: moved to Other Three Kingdoms Games. ~LW

[GuangRong]

Legend of KM doesn't work on XP ?
I too have a win 98 machine (my old rig) , but I only got one monitor for 2 CPUs...
I dun care to play the game ever again ,but I kept the CD handy so I
can watch the movies (actually the terrible voice "acting")to get a good laugh ..

Hmm, not sure if you'er familiar with the term R-SLG(or something likedat).

The legend of .... games are typical R-SLGs ,
which is basically a Role-playing game on rails and stripped-down only to the "town" parts and battles..
gameplay is a series of canned Missions (usually battles). In between the missions you go to "town" to outfit and prepare your party for the next battle

This genre is also known for it's DIFFCULTY..
INSANE enemy numbers and giving the enemy lotsa hitpoint's/damage (via much higher level)
though unless scripted the AI is very predictable

to make things even harder, some times they thrown in a time-limit , or a sucidal mission critical unit you have no control over and other limitations

Though as RSLG games goes, the KOEI games are quite Ok,you could keep pace with the enemy without too much powegaming..

if you're still have no idea what I'm talking about .. a familiar eg. of this type of game is final fantasy tactics.

[James]

if you're still have no idea what I'm talking about .. a familiar eg. of this type of game is final fantasy tactics.

So is it like Final Fantasy Tactics, Disgaea, Ogre Battle, Vandal Hearts, etc?

Or is it like Fire Emblem? It sounds more like Fire Emblem?

[GuangRong]

I've only play Final Fantasy tactics myself and have a vague idea of Orge battle,..duuno about the others..

In the case of the KOEI the games, the units represents officers and thier troops.
Even so their functions roughly corrrespond with basic RPG classes
Eg.
Cao Cao's cavarly = tanks
Xiahou Yuan's cavarly archer =range
Cao Ang's infanrty = meatshield
Kongming's strategist = Mage
minor officer's supply cart/Military band = healer/buffers

typical of R-RPGs, u can upgrade your units (class) when you reached certain levels or gain certain equipment..

For eg. Cao Cao's Light cavarly will ugrade to Heavy cavarly
Cao Ang's Light infantry will upgrade to Heavy infantry..

[Lady Wu]

Legend of KM doesn't work on XP ?

At least I can't make them work... Legend of Heroes has to be run under DOS or a DOS emu, but I dunno if there is a DOS release of LoKM.

In between the missions you go to "town" to outfit and prepare your party for the next battle

All except for Legend of CC, where there is no town and you get all your information from your officers in your tent. Which makes sense, since Cao Cao isn't the type of person who would mingle with the peasants and whatnot...

Legend of Heroes and Kongming aren't too hard--there are a couple of hard levels in Heroes (Changban 1 and 2, no save in between, and you have to protect these slow-moving peasants all the way to the end of level 2; and Yiling 2), but I don't remember *any* of the levels in LoKM (probably because it was too easy--tried as I could, I couldn't get Kongming to die at Wuzhang Yuan and get the second ending!). LoCC is more consistently challenging.

I also think that this series has more replayability than the RTK series. The AI, though predictable, seems smarter than that of RTK, and most levels have more than one way to be passed. In LoH (maybe LoKM too? Forget liao...) there is a bunch of generals that may join you if you figure out the right person to talk to them with (getting Zhang Liao in LoH is the best thing, since all your other chariot units are crap!), though that feature is not in LoCC (however, under circumstances, you can get Guan Yu to join you, hehehe).

BTW, where is Cao Ang an infantry?

[GuangRong]

At least I can't make them work... Legend of Heroes has to be run under DOS or a DOS emu, but I dunno if there is a DOS release of LoKM.

what exactly do u mean by "doesn't run" ??

I tried.. it works .., though not without some fiddling with the executable..
Though there's a Snag...
I have to run it in a window ..
And the screen remain blackout when it fade during screens transitions ..
Though u can make it come back by "refreshing" the game window (i.e minimize it and back)
just 2 mouse clicks, not too much hassle considering you have to click alot anyway for the exposition..

Other than this 2 issues , everthing else seems to work prefectly..

BTW, where is Cao Ang an infantry?

I though he's unit is bunch of spearman in Legend of Cao cao??
or perhaps I mixed him up with Mori's eldest son in Legend of Mori..

[Carp's Tail]

re: Legend of Heroes
After Liu Bei enters Shu and fends of Zhang He, you can see there are various battle points on the map which never seem to be used. For example, I seem to remember that Ba Xi was on the map as a point marked by two crossed swords just northeast of Chengdu. I could never visit it, but it was there nonetheless.

re: Legend of Kong Ming
I've never been able to get Kong Ming to die at Wu Zhang Plains. His heart meter is always at 5. I heard a rumour that you could get Kong Ming to die, as it was in the history, but never figured out how to get it to work.

[Lady Wu]

re: Legend of Kong Ming
I've never been able to get Kong Ming to die at Wu Zhang Plains. His heart meter is always at 5. I heard a rumour that you could get Kong Ming to die, as it was in the history, but never figured out how to get it to work.

Rumour has it that if you retreat enough times over the course of the game, the heart meter would go down. But I think normally I finish the game without retreating even once.

But I may have remembered wrong... I take back what I said about the difficulty of Legend of Heroes--I'm stuck in Jieqiao!!!!!! I think the problem is that I didn't level up enough earlier on... (but how? I already had people attack troops of a higher level, didn't let Tao Qian join the first battle, chose Julu (the crazy Zhang He level) over Qinghe, etc...)

Edit: I take that back too! I meant I couldn't sneak attack the granary in Jieqiao and get the 50 bonus exp points, hehehe